Thursday, March 15, 2012

4th Annual Student Exhibit

Noa ShawOlivia WilinskiCarin CaliMiles ShawOlivia CanovaEmily Haag
Joan NajarianJoan with her Handmade BookPhillip NezamisHannah ManningJake ScordatoJake Scordato
Emily HaagWill SommaJune NezamisJune NezamisPhoebe NezamisTraillWorks Students
The ShawsSchaeffer with her studentsStudents viewing the worksPhoebe sharing her workArtist, Robin LennonLooking at the work
4th Annual Student Exhibit, a set on Flickr.
Whew! TraillWorks just held it's 4th Annual Student Exhibition opening reception this past Saturday. It was a great success! Thank you to all of the talented students who participated and the support of all of their parents, family and friends. While I have several adult students, the exhibit happens to fall during Youth Art Month, a national annual observance each March to emphasize the value of K-12 art education for all children and to encourage support for quality school art programs.

The gallery and studios were buzzing with artists and their guests. Even the NJ Herald sent a photographer - we got an excellent photo spread in this Monday's paper.

During the reception, students had an opportunity to work with their friends and family in drawing a collective 5- Line Portrait. This was inspired by my reading of Daniel Pink's A Whole New Mind in which he mention's a great activity to utilize the right brain. He learned this technique from a Betty Edward's workshop, the author of Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. It was amazing to see each person's portrayal of themselves, using only 5 lines and how everyone, regardless of talent was able to accomplish it. Each rendering looked like the artist!

Participating students also had to submit artistically-presented snacks for the reception. The submissions were outstanding this year and twice we had to break a tie for the winners. I'm pleased to announce, 1st place went to Miles Shaw for his tree cake, depicting a watercolor he created; 2nd place went to Will Somma for his Picasso-inspired self-portrait cake; 3rd place went to Carin Cali for her flowers in the grass fruit tray; and a prize was awarded to Amanda Canova for voting in the contest.

Congratulations to all of the winners of the food contest and more importantly, to all of the students who have developed their work with me over the past year. My students should all get a pat on the back for the hard work they have shown. I'd also like to commend, Alyse DiBlasio, Assistant Curator, Marketer and Developer, for her successful curatiing of the exhibit, and Kassandra Talmadge, Graphic Designer and Sales Associate, for her help in developing all of the promotional materials.

If you have not had a chance to stop in the exhibit, it runs through April 1st. Please come and support the many student artists at TraillWorks. Read more about the exhibit in our press release here.